Did the Olympics Convince China to Go Green?

It seems the massive attempts to thwart air pollution in Beijing for the Olympics has had a lasting positive effect on the massive Chinese city. Appreciating the cleaner air, Beijing officials have begun a 6-month trial period of new vehicle ban regulations.

It remains to be seen whether these regulations – which ban government and private vehicles from being on the road certain days of the week and mandate citizens to take public transportation at least once a week – will remain in place past this trial period or not. The restrictions aren’t as limiting as the ones set in place for the Olympics, but they go a long way toward curbing the 3.5 million registered automobiles normally on Beijing’s streets.

China is also stepping up production of clean-energy cars for both the private sector and for public transportation. Beijing recently built a new subway, an airport rail link, and introduced 23 fuel cell cars, 470 electric cars, and 102 hybrid cars to their public transport fleet.

Wan Gang, the father of China’s green-car R&D program and the minister of science and technology, is extremely happy with the new green initiatives.

“The Olympics taught us all a good lesson,” he says in the Newsweek article. “Now people all over the country have an urgent desire for a better environment.”

Of course, not everyone is happy about the new regulations. To a lot of people, having a car means having freedom, plain and simple. That’s why it’s important to not just ban vehicles, but to create more clean-energy vehicles.

Hopefully China will also begin to focus on decreasing industrial pollution – all those factories and construction sites contribute greatly to the suffocating smog in Beijing and around the world. But this is definitely a step in the right direction!